Thank You… Chess Not Checkers Launches!

This week, we launched my new book, Chess Not Checkers. If you have been on this site in the last few weeks, you may have seen some of the ideas from the book. Rather than recap or summarize any content in this post, I want to pause and say thank you to the men and women who have contributed directly to this project.
As I thought about how to do this, I realized the Acknowledgments from the book itself would be a good place to begin. So, if you are interested, here are the people who brought this book to life…
To begin, I want to thank the people who helped create the core content: Jeff Steggert, Scott Wozniak, and Betsy Zint played indispensable roles in the process of bringing this book to life. Their research, insight, creativity, and dedication to the work, combined with their patience with me, were remarkable. Their diligence during this project enabled us to find a realistic and proven path to high performance. That was the first domino that had to fall, or this book would not exist. Thank you!
Thanks to the following business leaders who provided working laboratories in which we could identify and validate the ideas outlined in this book: Ryan Allen, Paul Becker, Chris Beckler, William Boulware, Bryan Bullington, Roger Clark, John Collette, Mandy Cooper, Kurt Davis, Joseph DeCola, Ryan Dennis, Glen Efford, Scott Fraser, Jamie Fuller, Bob Garrett, Natasha Gilbert, Quart Graves, Michael Hancock, Joe Hatzopoulos, Robert Hensen, John Hughes, Duane Johnston, Gary Kasprzak, Greg Kubala, Brad Lingerfelt, Mike Ludwig, Frieda Marroquin, Matt Michaels, John Moore, Mike Moore, Rob Morris, Bart Norman, Cliff Parker, Greg Patterson, Daniel Perry, Becky Pickle, Joseph Piotrowski, Lauren Plain, Jonathan Purser, Dusty Pyne, Gene Robinson, Rob Rogers, Dean Sandbo, Craig Saxton, Josh Sells, Chug Shafe, Kendrick Skipper, Bruce Slone, Dan Stanko, Rick Starkweather, Art TerKeurst, Shane Todd, KJ Wari, Matt Webber, Joe Weber, Erich Weiss, Luke Wilbanks, Brad Williams, and Cindy Wilson.
Thanks also to the team that commissioned this work years ago. Tim Tassopoulos, Andrew Cathy, Dee Ann Turner, Cliff Robinson, and Rob Dugas saw the need for this project. Their instincts were correct: High performance is not a matter of circumstances, luck, or DNA. High performance is about choices—just like chess. Thanks for your vision and your leadership.
Thanks to my wife Donna and to my friends Randy Gravitt and Mark Conklin, who joined the outstanding editorial team at Berrett-Koehler to edit and polish this manuscript. Their efforts added tremendous value—in both content and style.
And, finally, as noted earlier, this book is dedicated to Truett Cathy. Chick-fil-A is not a perfect organization. However, Truett understood the key to long-term success is much more about chess than it is checkers. I’m thankful he showed me, and the world, how to play the game exceedingly well.
I also want to thank the team from Weaving Influence for getting the word out about this book. Christy and Becky have led their team to create a comprehensive plan to share this book with the world. (If you would like to help, go to ChessNotCheckers.com.) Thank you!
We’ve also done something different for this book – rather than waiting to create resources, we have ALREADY created supporting tools to help you translate the ideas in the book into reality in your world. Randy Gravitt helped create an amazing Field Guide and video series. Thank you Randy!
If you decide to read the book, and share it with others, I would like to add your name to the acknowledgements, too. Helping leaders learn to play Chess Not Checkers will make our world a better place to live – not just for us, for future generations as well.[GLS_Shield]